Visitation
An Avengers/Thor fan fiction

Warnings: N/A

Summary: It started with a texting/roleplaying conversation between me and my then girlfriend, as Loki and Thor respectively. And then I thought it would make a nice, feely, kind of cute story.

It was an awfully cool morning in the Asgardian realm – the warrior could almost swear he felt a chilling wind stir through his hair and sweep over his skin. He shivered; he wasn't fond of it. On a day like this one, with the purpose of this day, it sent a depressing sense of foreboding through him. He sighed, blue eyes flashing with determination after. Nothing was going to come in the way of his intentions for the day. Not after he had worked up the nerve for this, waited far too long to do as he needed.

He walked on foot, stride confident and quick. It was not a long walk from the palace of his father to the prison; after all, the King of Asgard should be able to easily access those who threatened his kingdom and their safety.

"State your business," came the deep voice of a massive guard, monotone and unwavering.

"I am Thor, Son of Odin, and I am here to see my brother," Thor said, voice ringing with surety.

The guard's dark eyes flashed with surprise before returning to vacancy and blankness as if a clean black slate. He seemed surprised that, for all the transgressions and sins that Loki committed, for the fact they did not share blood or even race, Thor still counted him as a brother, perhaps one of the strongest bond a man could have. He, like others, was shocked that such a bond had not been broken by the blood spilled between them.

The guard moved aside and allowed him passage into the prison. Thor dipped his head and proceeded in, where a warden led him to where the second son of Odin was kept locked away. His transgressions were far greater than other prisoners; and he was more volatile as well as mentally damaged. He was a much more dangerous prisoner altogether. Therefore, his cell was deep within the prison, where he was less of a risk to others if he were to lose whatever sanity he had left.

However, when he came into Thor's view, he didn't appear dangerous. His pale face seemed thin, his cheeks hollow and eyes dark and vacant. His hair was long and disheveled, prisoners' clothes wrinkled and worn. Through his brother's eyes, the warrior could see he was distanced – he was somewhere Thor feared he could not reach. Through the glass cage, Thor could see him slumped against a wall, despondent like an abandoned ragdoll. (Unlike the humans' cage, glass in Asgard could be magicked into being unbreakable, especially to someone weaponless and possibly will-less.)

The warden left with a dip of his head, allowing the brothers privacy.

"So, the mortal one is back from his precious Midgard," Loki said, voice sharp and antagonistic. It seemed to contrast too heavily with his new look – such a dead face but lively voice.

Thor felt himself flinch inwardly – he had hoped, somewhere in his optimistic heart that Loki had changed, even slightly, for the better – but was also offended at the mortal part, as if mortals were soft. As if he was soft because of his love for the Midgardian people when that was not so. He was still a powerful and capable warrior; empathy did not change that. He was still Asgardian, through and through, and immortal by most means.

"How dare'st thee call me a mere mortal. You of all know that I am of Asgard!" Thor retorted, eyebrows furrowing. Love for Midgard and its people do not take away what I am by birth…

An old spark – a spark that hadn't existed in months, maybe years as days faded and blended, he couldn't tell how long he'd been here – arose in Loki at this. He sat up a little straighter, green eyes flashing. "I will call you as I want, foolish one. I am the rightful king of Asgard."

Thor was struck by this. His hope for Loki all but dissipated and for a moment he debated with himself if Loki could be saved at all. He had wanted from the very beginning for his brother to be able to change. For him to abandon these feelings that he had been cast aside by Odin's as an unfavorited child, when they had been loved equally. For him to recover from this insanity that gripped him, the poison spread by the Tesseract. What did kingship matter – for Thor would've chosen Loki to advise him, to stand by him in battle! What did Odin matter – when it was Thor he was raised beside, played with, and his favorite?

He had wished that Loki would give up these pointless ideals, so he could be welcomed home. But it seemed Loki still gripped them tightly like a child to a toy.

"No, brother, do not be this way," Thor said, trying for compassion but his voice was still commanding. He forced his voice to be softer – hard for such a deep, masculine voice and continued, "And I am not foolish, just naïve; the man of iron says so."

Loki's whole body seemed to sag with the sigh that escaped him. Once more he seemed defeated and hollow. The spark that had glowed again was just that, a spark. It went out and withered away. Despite the emptiness that pulsed from him, Thor was relieved; perhaps Loki could have salvation.

"Naïve you are, I won't argue against that," Loki replied after a moment, looking up at Thor with a smirk.

Thor smiled almost instinctively. The Loki he knew was still there; he was just buried under a dysfunctional outside shell. Thor only needed to be able to pull him out.

He walked closer to the glass and pressed a hand to it, spreading his fingers. With the sheer force of will, he managed to phase through the glass barrier between Loki and himself. Asgardian glass cages were, as said, unlike human ones. They were magicked. They could not be bent or broken from the inside, but someone with certain permissions could morph to and fro when coming from the outside.

Loki nearly sprang to his feet instinctively – perhaps, defensively, and for a brief second Thor wondered what punishment exactly Loki received here – but Thor merely maintained his smile, friendly and reassuring as he approached his brother.

Thor clapped him on the back. "Good, I do so hate when we argue."

Loki sort of bent forward, stumbling slightly. It was a moment before he replied – he was taken aback at the calm air in which surrounded Thor, the friendliness in which he treated him with. After all he had done, Thor was still forgiving. Thor was still… brotherly, as it seemed to just now sink in the word Thor referred to him as. Behind his hollow mask, he was surprised.

"Must you slap me around so?" Loki asked, raising a slender black brow, looking to Thor out of the corner of his eye with his head slightly tilted. Without his say, a tiny laugh escaped him; the sound was foreign in his ears and he wondered how it even came to be.

Thor released a hearty, masculine laugh. "You are such a small giant, I must say, dear brother. Perhaps you could join the Avengers and I for training one day? Put some meat on your bones, as the Midgardians say."

Loki was confused onto how Thor could so simply disregard the fact that he was in fact visiting Loki in prison, and his sentence still had many years before it was over. His crime was one of, if not the, greatest crimes of all Asgardian prisoners. However, with an internal shrug, he cast it off as Thor's wishful thinking, and he could, for a moment, think like him.

Loki laughed a nervous chuckle. "Aheh, well, we don't have the best record, the Avengers and I. Though," he paused to ponder before continuing, "Mr. Stark did offer me drink that he never gave."

"Ah, the man of iron has told me of this occurrence; I recall it happened during your siege of Manhattan, yes? You did not much deserve a drink, I don't believe," Thor replied.

"Deserving or not, he still made an offer he didn't follow through with," Loki pointed out. He sighed again, sounding hollow and somewhat casual, as if he didn't actually care. "And I believe, in this confinement, I've paid for my crimes. It helps though, that on Midgard, drinks make things less… awkward, or so I've heard."

"Of course I know about Midgardian drinks – Tony insists we imbibe fine Midgardian ales often," Thor responded, smiling. He added in a lower voice, as if Tony were actually there, "Though I prefer Asgardian meads to all else."

Loki allowed himself a sardonic, dry chuckle. "I didn't very well have time to sample anything, now did I?"

Thor mimicked his chuckle with his own warm, deep one. "I guess not, I guess not."

Loki was once more surprised at how lightly Thor acted, as if the events such as the siege were some game. As if things were really alright between them. No… more like, he understood him. Something inside him coiled and tensed, but he released it with a clench and release of his fist. He turned toward Thor, completely facing him.

"And I'm not too sure your friends will be as welcoming as you," Loki added, as if making an excuse list of why not to join in his offer. "Especially the woman, Natasha, who interrogated me."

Come to think of it, Loki wasn't very fond of her either, and wasn't sure he'd be able to stand her very presence.

"Natasha is a fierce warrior; I find myself fearful when she is preparing for battle," Thor pointed out, in the back of his mind noting that she was not nearly as physically terrifying as Lady Sif.

Loki seemed to be sighing a lot, with small shrug. "I can't say I'm too terribly afraid of her – I know weaknesses. She is human, after all. Breakable."

Loki gave an imperceptible shake of his head. I know, I mustn't think that way. What would you think of that, Thor? You wouldn't want that of me.

Thor gave Loki a very stern look. "Weak? Weak is the woman who outsmarted you, out-worded you and out-thought your silver tongue and sharp mind? Defeated your Tesseract contraption?" He shook his head. "I think not."

It amused Loki the way he said "contraption" – as if it was hard to understand, as if he couldn't get how Natasha could break such a thing. But the amusement was short-lived. He was offended by being outdone; her gender meant nothing, but his pride was wounded that he was defeated at all. Even if he lacked the drive to repeat such an event, his pride remained. He had to resort back to finding an insult her; he would not be outdone.

"She is emotionally weak in a way I am not. I know what she fears, when she can't say the same for me," Loki said finally.

To Loki, fear was weakness. It left one open, their heart and mind in a panic, ready to be attacked. Insanity and possession by a wild dream, unattainable and corrosive, was somehow strength. It was protection. His heart was hardened. I haven't changed at all, Thor.

Thor, however, was baffled. He did not share such an ideology. To the empathetic warrior, compassion and emotions were added strength. It gave reason to fight, driving you to fight harder, better for those who mattered. Those who you fought for meant more than your own life. Fear inherently then, was being strong – because fear goaded courage to come as well. That was strength, to him.

"Emotionally weak? She, like any good warrior of the mind, uses her emotions to her advantage. That is part of what makes her a formidable foe," Thor explained.

Loki pondered that for a while. If Thor valued emotions on the field of battle, if he counted that as strength, did that mean Thor thought him as weak, because he was callous and closed-off in comparison? After all he was capable, and he was still not enough. Another thought occurred; the possibility that Thor could see his emotional side. Thor had seen it, after all. All throughout childhood, before he let himself fall into the void – even in Manhattan, perhaps. He didn't like the idea, in a sense – too long thinking his way of strength and weaknesses disallowed it. But somehow, it almost… warmed him to think Thor might view him as a formidable opponent.

"Then perhaps… it is I who is weak? And I simply have an inferiority complex?" Loki suggested, his voice sounding more like questioning than stating.

Thor merely shook his head without a second thought. "You have your own strengths, brother. But alas, with strengths come weaknesses."

Loki could agree to that. Even he, who he had once that was infallible, once he had risen from the shadow of his big brother's greatness, must have his own faults. He succumbed to this rationale, even if it meant that he too, must be weak sometimes. As if he'd been struck, he realized why Thor liked the humans so much; perhaps they were not so different from themselves. They must have, to at least Thor, strengths of their own, and therefore weakness. There were good and bad things about them. Loki's pride merely kept him from seeing this; his fragmented mind could not see past its own blinding bigoted ideals.

"That's what makes us like the humans, yes?" Loki offered after a pregnant pause.

Thor nodded in agreement. "Those of Asgard and those of Midgard are never as different as either would like to think."

Loki took that in for a few minutes. He wondered, just exactly what that meant. Did Thor think that perhaps, Loki was like the humans he was so enraptured by? That perhaps, they were not so different and Loki was capable of the things that humans such as the Avengers were? Loki wondered if there was a life outside of this prison and all it entailed; living in the shadows in some shape or another. That there was a chance for change. Admittance and redemption were foreign things to the frost giant, but, if Thor thought it was so – with time, perhaps, there was a chance.

"But is there really a chance for change now? Things cannot be so carelessly cast aside; once it's brought into the light, you cannot hide it," Loki pointed out, sounding cold and unattached. Empty. "You cannot hide that I'm a monster. You cannot ignore the blood on my hands. So tell me, can I ever be forgiven? Do I really have a chance with these people?"

Thor immediately opened his mouth to counter, but closed it in thought. He pondered those words. He didn't like the way his brother referred to himself as a monster – the same word he had called the Jotunheim people, the Frost Giants and he wondered if he thought of himself as little as he did that race. It didn't look like a good prospect; Thor's heart ached for Loki.

"I… I've forgiven you though I cannot say the same for the rest of the team. I believe our relationship may well heal, if we give it the chance," Thor answered finally. Optimism was a grand thing; even in the bleakest of prospects it shone like a guiding star.

Loki let out a soft, dry laugh with a little smile. He shook his head. "But why? You count Midgard as a home as much as Asgard, those people as much as family as I. And I ruined it, destroyed it without a second thought in my anger. And you," Loki paused his speech to make a small "ha" noise, "have forgiven me."

Thor smiled at him. "Of course I did. We're family. You are my brother. I will always forgive you. I wish as much as you do you were not here in this prison. I wish for you to be home."

And then there's me, forever with the sappy endings. My heart bleeds for Loki, it really does. I don't love him because he's hot; I love him because he's not pure or perfect. He's damaged. He's broken. He's a liar, and he doesn't know how to stop. He hates himself but is in love with what he pretends to be. Complex and wounded by perceptions that he refuses to let go; there will never be a character I love like Loki. Tom Hiddleston really does show such depth to this man, and I love it. Chris Hemsworth puts a nice spin on Thor (or a maybe just a side we're not expecting) - how brotherly he is to a man that doesn't act as if he loves him, how optimistic he is for his brother turned rival, how forgiving. It's almost unreal how he acts. Everything is perfect. And everything hurts.

I apologize for the rant, it's just, I have a lot of feelings.